Decisions, Decisions

In our daily lives we have countless decisions that need to be made. Especially when it comes to our shopping Trips.

Consumer Decision Making

During a shopping trip at the grocery store I needed the simple item of a big packet of chips. I was bombarded with half a lane in the isle just with chips. As I was scanning all the flavors I couldn’t make a decision of which one to purchase.  Little over a generation chips came in just a few flavors such as salted, cheese and onion, or salt and vinegar. Today the choice is immense with Thai sweet chili, balsamic vinegar and caramelized onion, Oriental red curry, lime and coriander chutney, vintage cheddar and onion chutney, buffalo mozzarella and herbs, chicken tikka and many more from different brands. In the end all these choices made me overwhelmed and instead of just picking one I simple just left the store.

Daniel McFadden, an economist at the University of California, Berkeley, says that consumers find too many options troubling because of the “risk of misperception and miscalculation, of misunderstanding the available alternatives, of misreading one's own tastes, of yielding to a moment's whim and regretting it afterwards”, combined with “the stress of information acquisition.

There have been many studies that marketers have done to test whether more choices were a better option for consumers.  In a simple test with jam where 24 flavors were offered to be tasted 60% of people stopped to sample the jam. When 6 flavors were offered only 40 percent tasted the sample. However of the customers who sampled the 24 flavors only 3 percent had purchased the jam and those who sampled the 6 flavors, 30 percent had purchased. We can clearly see just by this one study the different less choice has made in purchase decisions.

A 2010 study by researchers at the University of Bristol found that 47% of respondents thought life was more confusing than it was ten years ago, and 42% reported lying awake at night trying to resolve problems.  Making Decisions when it comes to shopping would possibly reduce this and make things shopping easier.

Yes, most of us as humans like having options and not feeling like we are being forced to make certain decisions because there is only one brand or one category to choose from, but is having 30 different options for one product really necessary.  Should marketers cut down on their product options? Many would say that it would depend and only by testing they would know because every situation and market is different.

 Just like in my experience and many others. Customers can be attracted to a large number of choices, but when it comes time to make a purchase, too many options can make decision making difficult and lead many to walk away.